To move around with confidence in an urban environment when you are visually impaired, it is better to have a dog or a white cane. But a Chinese team from the University of Shanghai, whose work has just been presented in the journal Nature Machine Intelligence, has planned an even more sophisticated system, namely a pair of connected glasses.
An AI that scans the environment every 250 milliseconds
The device, still in prototype form, plans to equip the glasses with a camera filming the person's environment, as well as an AI using machine learning to record changes in the environment in which the person is moving every 250 milliseconds. This precision allows it, through audio and vibration alerts, to then alert the user to guide them, who will then be able to navigate around any obstacles in their path in order to avoid them.
According to initial tests conducted on a dozen visually impaired people, the walking distance and navigation time of visually impaired have been improved by 25% compared to using a cane to cross a 25-meter-long course recreated indoors, a sort of labyrinth. But wearing these glasses has also been tested in real life, as demonstrated in the video below.
Bracelets that vibrate when approaching obstacles
The article, published in mid-April 2025, states that the team has also developed an additional navigation aid, with soft silicone patches that visually impaired people can also wear on their fingers and hands. These bracelets, which also have their own camera system, begin to vibrate if an obstacle between 5 and 40 centimeters from the person is detected.
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Beyond the necessary continuation of tests on a larger number of visually impaired people, the team even plans to eventually integrate the device into a contact lens!
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